Recommended games in Simulation

Beholder - a creepy game about choices and consequences

Beholder is a dark game. And it can be really dark. It’s a game about surveillance, choices, and consequences. In the (possibly not so) distant future surveillance is the norm and the player is a state-appointed monitor of that information. The player is the manager of an apartment building who has been assigned by the state to monitor the residents. The choices made in the game have direct impact on the tenants of the building, if the info is reported. And that’s the main choice in the game. We done, compelling, and voyeuristic and sadistic fun.

Kingdom: New Lands out on mobile, finally

Of all games I’ve played over the past year or more, I’ve played Kingdom and the New Lands expansion the most. I can best describe Kingdom as a one dimensional simulation game. The only way to move on the island is left/right while riding your mount. Along the way recruit troops, build an encampment and walls, defend your encampment, and try to get off the island. Remarkably simple, yet I have over 200 hours into the game, it’s very sticky and repeatable.

I’ve been beta testing the mobile version for a few months now and have come to love it more than the desktop version. I’m not 100% sure I agree with the way progress is saved on mobile (only at the dawn of a new day), but it’s has worked out well to save me a couple times. Well worth the download to see what a sim game can really be on mobile.

Escape prison in this open world simulation

The Escapists was a popular PC game that is now out on iOS. In this open world game with more than a little bit of a humor slant, the goal is to escape increasingly difficult prisons. Starting out in a cushy minimum security prison, gather items, craft and trade them to build what’s needed to escape. Each prison presents unique obstacles and there are multiple ways to escape each one. A very repeatable and fun game that works well on mobile. What took so long?

Human Resources Corporation, a fun programming introduction game is available now

Human Resources Corporation, from some of the same fine folks that brought us World of Goo is a puzzle games that makes some of the basics of programming into a fun little exercise.

The premise is that the player is a new recruit in a corporation that need to tell other in game characters how to move and act by giving a set of program commands to complete tasks. It’s a great introduction to the logic used in programming and a fun little game with great personality. Which is expected considering the team that created this.

Crashlands "Holy Wompits, This is Amazing" - 5/5 from Touch Arcade

Crashlands is simply an excellent game that is a lot of fun to play. Every time I open the game to check something really quickly for this review, I end up playing it for another hour. It’s the most enjoyment I’ve had with any crafting game, and is honestly one of the best games I’ve played on iOS. It’s exceptionally rare for a game that has both open world emergent gameplay and a linear main quest to not drop the ball on one of those things or the other, but Crashlands nails it on all counts. Consider this one an absolute essential.

Downtown Showdown - "turns city building into competition" - AppTrigger

There’s nothing quite as pleasantly surprising as a mobile game that starts out looking like one thing and morphs into something else. Downtown Showdown, the second release from Colopl for the western market, is like that. Early on, it seems like just another Sim City-style city-builder, but as you play more, it reveals some more competitive DNA.

That’s because you’re not only trying to build the best city you can, but also to take sides in the conflict between rival businessmen Zach Gold and Bill Banks. On top of that, there’s also a very real competitive multiplayer element, where you have to recruit attacker units to muck up cities built by other players and compete to see who can build the best city in a limited amount of time.

These games were all phenomenal when they were released, Rockstar knows what they’re doing when it comes to porting them, and it’s hard to beat the price to hours of potential gameplay ratio, particularly when considering you can play a GTA game nearly infinitely if you enjoy just rampaging around the city, getting your wanted level up, and seeing how long you can survive. Of course there’s loads of side quests too, giving you even more to do in a game that’s already packed with content.
If you’re into the idea of playing a GTA game but aren’t sure which one to get, I’d definitely start with San Andreas first. It was designed with the scope of console play in mind, and I think the game world is just a little more interesting. That being said, if you’ve been playing along with every GTA release Rockstar has made on iOS over the years, Liberty City Stories is every bit as must-have as the rest of them.

Star Hammer: The Vanguard Prophecy, published by Slitherine, has ships. A gritty, granular turn-based smorgasbord of ships. Having jumped from PC to iPad, one of 2015’s better strategies has arrived intact.

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Star Hammer touts a hefty sixty-odd mission campaign beyond its skirmish component. Single player offers a few temporary twists in branching sorties. While these are minor divergences to encourage repeat playthroughs, the campaign is straightforward and offers a decent upward difficulty swing. Introductory operations have players shunting small fleets about, completing entry-level objectives like protecting salvage operations and fending off scant Nautilid marauders to blood their ships and gain fleet experience. Command points are awarded for completed missions, thereafter used to bring more hardware into the vacuum. By the later stages of the game, it’s a case of musing over fleet composition; what vessels to bring out and who to leave on the bench.

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